Police, Public Sector & Peace Marketing campaign – Thursday tenth Might 2012 noticed two quite totally different marches by employees happening in London, with a big protest by police and a day of public sector strikes with commerce unionists marching to a rally. I additionally visited the Parliament Sq. Peace Marketing campaign.
Police March In opposition to Cuts and Winsor
An estimated 20,000 police from all 43 forces in England & Wales marched by central London in protest at 20% cuts in police funds and proposed restructuring following the Winsor overview. Different teams together with Occupy and Proper To Protest and others joined in name for justice within the policing of protest.
Police should not allowed to strike or belong to a correct commerce union however can be part of the Police Federation, a employees affiliation that may characterize and help their pursuits. Though it can not name for strike motion it could possibly organise demonstrations equivalent to this one, attended by off-duty police and a few relations.
It was an impressively massive march, however quite uninteresting because it marched previous the House Workplace, the Homes of Parliament and Downing St, most carrying black caps. The Police Federation had supplied 16,000 black caps to characterize the variety of warranted officers anticipated to be misplaced over the following 4 years because of the reduce within the police funds of 20-30%.
My photos focus an excessive amount of on the comparatively few officers from some areas who had include placards. Most easily marched and primarily in silence. A couple of carried carried small posters with the names of officers who had been unable to attend resulting from being at work – and there have been some police who had been policing the police protest, on quite higher behaviour than at another protests.
Some individuals additionally got here to protest towards the police, with the House Hijackers organising a ‘skilled protest stall‘ in conjunction with the march providing recommendation on making placards and chanting. A lot of the police marchers had been amused by their chants equivalent to ‘One Answer – Establishment’ and among the mock placards, though there have been just a few jeers.
These Police policing the protest had been much less amused, and threatened the House Hijackers with arrest until they eliminated one in all their placards with the well-known acronym ACAB. Additionally they stood in entrance to try to disguise them and different protesters together with these with a ‘Defend the Proper to Protest’ who had been shouting slogans towards police violence and over deaths in custody for which there’s seldom if any justice.
Some from Occupy London had include plastic police helmets to hitch within the march, saying they weren’t towards the police however referred to as for a drive that labored for the 99% quite than the 1%, or as one long-winded placard put it, “A completely, Publicly funded, democratically accountable Police drive who’s goals and aims enshrine the precise to peaceable Protest in some kind of Individuals’s Constitution!”
Others participating on the march included Ian Puddick who acquired intimidated, attacked and prosecuted by Metropolis of London Terrorism Police and Counter Terrorism Directorate in an operation costing hundreds of thousands carried out on behalf of a large US safety company after he found his spouse had been having an affair with one in all her bosses. He marched with an indication ‘Police Corruption‘ and sadly there may be nonetheless quite a lot of that in addition to racism in forces across the nation.
Extra on My London Diary at Police March In opposition to Cuts and Winsor.
Public Sector Pensions Strike and March
Unite, PCS and UCU had been holding a sooner or later strike towards public sector cuts in pensions, jobs and companies. Many had been up within the early hours picketing at their workplaces lengthy earlier than I arrived in London, however there have been nonetheless pickets in place after I visited Tate Britain and walked previous the Home of Commons on my method to a rally exterior St Thomas’ Hospital on the other financial institution of the Thames.
I arrived late for the rally there and other people had been simply on the brink of march to a bigger rally at Methodist Central Corridor.
Staff are incensed by will increase of their pension contributions and plans to extend them additional. They’re additionally frightened by the growing state retirement age which additionally applies to their pensions. Now in 2024 it’s 66 and can improve to 67 between 2026 and 2028. An additional rise to 68 is deliberate and the date for that’s more likely to be introduced ahead – because the rise to 67 was.
As they marched, individuals had been chanting “Sixty-eight – is TOO Late“. Pensioners additionally really feel they’re being cheated by the federal government’s choice to index them to the CPI inflation quite than the upper RPI inflation figures, which is able to imply them receiving some 15-20% much less. Over 94% of Unite’s NHS members voted to reject the federal government’s proposals and take strike motion at the moment together with members from the Ministry of Defence and authorities departments in addition to others from the PCS and UCU.
I left the marchers as they went into the rally at Central Corridor and returned to {photograph} the police march and go to the peace camp in Parliament Sq..
Extra photos at Public Sector Pensions Strike and March.
4000 Days in Parliament Sq.
I went to speak with Barbara Tucker who was persevering with the Parliament Sq. Peace Marketing campaign begun by Brian Haw on the 2nd June 2001. The protest, continued by her and different supporters was about to achieve a complete of 4000 days of 24 hour protest within the sq., with others within the group sustaining the presence on these numerous events when Brian or Barbara was arrested and held in a single day.
That they had then continued for nearly 11 years regardless of fixed harassment years by police, who’ve been pressured by politicians – in addition to passing two Acts of Parliament meant to finish the protest.
As I wrote in 2012:
A couple of hours earlier than I arrived, police had come and spent 90 minutes “looking out” the few sq. meters of their show within the early morning, and three days later, at 2.30am on Sunday 13 Might, police and Westminster Council got here and took away the 2 blankets that Barbara Tucker, now not allowed to have any “construction designed solely or primarily to sleep in” by regulation was utilizing to outlive within the open. This was apparently one in all two visits over the weekend by police and council through which they illegally eliminated property from the location.
Regardless of a rise in harassment as an important try was made to wash up the capital for the Olympics, the peace protest continued within the sq. for one more 12 months, with Barbara Tucker beginning a starvation strike in January 2013. Ultimately she turned too in poor health to proceed and the protest got here to an finish in Might 2013.
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Tags: ACAB, austerity, Barbara Tucker, black caps, cuts, Defend The Proper To Protest, House Workplace, Homes of Parliament, Ian Puddick, London, march, Occupy, occupy london, Parliament Sq. Peace Marketing campaign, PCS, peace, pension age, pension contributions, peter Marshall, picket, police, police funds, police corruption, Police Federation, police harassment, policing of protest, skilled protest stall, protest, public sector, public sector pensions, House Hijackers, strike, Tate Britain, UCU, Unite, Winsor
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